


outlawed

by pxl



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Abuse, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Self-Harm, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-10-22 02:32:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17654360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pxl/pseuds/pxl
Summary: It's the start of Eren's senior year of highschool, but life is slower than ever. It's the same thing every day - same people, same classes, same bad habits... but the cycle is broken the instant he steps foot into the crumbling streets of St. Saffron. It's a new world, filled with cigarette smoke and broken people with bad attitudes. It's only in one of these people that Eren is able to find the comfort he craves, and it's only in these streets that he's able to find the life that escaped him so long ago.It's not what he had planned... but maybe that's a good thing.





	outlawed

**Author's Note:**

> there are so many homes on every street, piling into lines so neat,  
> but i won't fold into these lives,  
> i'm too drunk on that suburban smell.

“Hellooooo,” I mumbled into the phone that had awoken me from my well-deserved nap. At least, I thought it was well-deserved, after an eight hour school day. I still hadn’t finished adjusting to my new so-called ‘normal’ sleep schedule of going to bed at eleven and waking up at seven, and naps were essential to my ability to function like a normal human - something I still managed to suck at, somehow.

“Eren?” Mikasa’s voice sounded through the phone speaker, her tone verging on disappointment. “Did I wake you up?”

“Mmmmh, yeah,” I hummed as I stretched. “Was gonna get up soon anyway,” I lied. I didn’t want to get up at all, not for the next hundred years at least, but she didn’t need to know that.

“Uh, I’d hope so, it’s almost five.”

I bit my tongue and resisted the temptation to tell her I didn’t really give a damn what time it was; all I knew was that it was Friday, and Fridays were when I laid in bed and felt sorry for myself, and she was being very bold to interrupt that, so it’d better be for a good reason.

“...Anyways,” she continued after a second. “I found this new place, it’s sorta downtown, down there by the parking deck. And it’s not a bar, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Wasn’t thinking that, but okay,” I interrupted.

“It’s a record store,” she went on, ignoring my snide comment. “Me and Armin are gonna check it out. You wanna come?”

“A _record_ store?” I asked. “I don’t have a record player, why the -”

“Eren, oh my God,” she interrupted me this time. “I’m trying to get you out of the house, you jerk. And Armin wants you to come, and it looks cool, and -”

 _“_ Fine! Fine,” I caved, mostly because I didn’t want to seem like an asshole, and also because, yeah, I probably _should_ get out of the house. It was suffocating. “I - ugh, I _just_ woke up -”

“Doesn’t matter, we’ll be there in ten -” and she hung up before I could protest.

It was the third week of school - maybe the fourth - and we were at that sickening point where it becomes clear if the year will be a good or bad one. I always thought of September as the month of change; changing leaves, changing grades, teachers, friends, classes. I figured it’d be different after graduating, but I was still almost a year away from that. It’s the tipping point of a new year - school year, anyway - where it becomes evident whether the rest of the year will be decent or not. I’d hoped my senior year would be the best of my life - I mean, that’s how it’s _supposed_ to go - but I was starting to lose hope. It felt like the beginning of the end.

I peeked through the blinds in the bathroom. It wasn’t much of a view - only the white siding of the neighbors’ house was visible - but that siding was tinted a pinkish purple so I figured it must be six or seven. _A little late to be making plans,_ I thought, but It wasn’t like I had anything better to do. I never did anything at home, really, besides napping and the occasional crime show binge. I didn’t mind it, but it was nice to get out sometimes.

I hardly had time to throw a sweatshirt on before I heard the unmistakable sound of Mikasa’s car-from-hell pulling into my driveway. It was an eighties-era nissan - she said she wanted something _‘vintage’_ \- and the engine was about the only thing that ran. No heating, no air conditioning, no radio… but the tape deck worked like a charm, of _course_.

“Someone’s cranky,” she teased as I fell into the backseat.

“You’d be cranky too if you’d only had ten minutes to get ready,” I said, sounding much more bitter than I felt. I hadn’t even told my dad that I was leaving.

“We have to keep you on your toes.” Armin whipped his head around to grin at me from the passenger seat. “And it’s just some run-down hipster place, you could roll out of bed and fit in just fine.”

“That’s pretty much all I did,” I said, and it was true. I was clearly the only one. Armin’s hair was pulled up into a bun for a change, and Mikasa had gone through the trouble of putting on makeup. The difference wouldn’t be obvious to a stranger, but I could tell. “Where is this place, anyway?”

“Don’t know for sure, actually,” Mikasa tapped her painted nails on the steering wheel as we pulled out of the driveway. Wine red. “Here, do the, uhh” - she reached an arm over her head and handed me her phone. “I don’t know the directions, all Annie said was that it’s ‘next to that tattoo place by the parking deck,’ like there aren’t a hundred tattoo places and a hundred parking decks around here. And it’s just called ‘Larksville Records,’ how generic is that?”

“You’re hanging out with _Annie_ now?” I asked, bemused, as I typed the name into the phone. “Isn’t she kind of, you know…” I wasn't sure what word I was looking for. _Weird? Creepy? Quiet? All three?_

“What, _cool?”_ she glared at me through the rear-view mirror. “You’re so judgemental. She works part-time here, so don’t be an ass if we see her.”

“Mikasa’s got a crush,” Armin said, quiet enough that he could take it back if he needed to. But Mikasa said nothing on the subject, so we fell into an amused quiet moment.

“Uh.” I broke the silence once the map finished loading. “I found the address, but...”

“Yeah?” Mikasa glanced back at me. “Let me see -”

“It’s literally right on the edge of St. Saffron,” I passed her phone back with some reluctance.

 _“Mikasa.”_ Armin warned as soon as I got the words out. “I _can’t_ do this, my family will _kill_ me. I mean it, they said that place is as dangerous as -”

“Damn, chill out,” Mikasa laughed, whether in excitement or nervousness I couldn’t tell. “Seriously, it’s not like we’re gonna be snorting coke off dumpster lids. It’s not as bad as people say.”

“You’ve been there?” I asked.

“You get up to some shit when you don’t have school to keep you busy,” she said simply. “It’s fun, there’s always something going on around there. Cool people, too, if you know where to look.”

Armin looked back at me as if to ask if there _was_ such a thing as a _‘cool people’_ in a place like that, and I shrugged. I’d only ever heard bad things about St. Saffron. A few kids from school hung out there on weekends, and they never went into much detail about what they got up to, but they were the type to show up on a Monday morning hungover with black eyes and busted lips. It was notorious for human trafficking, kidnappings, shootings, murders, gang wars… but I’d never been there, and it could just be rumors for all I knew.

 

There was an undeniable decline in the state of things as we neared our destination. Knocked over road signs, overgrown fences, crumbling sidewalks - all relatively rare sights in the inner city - became more and more common with every traffic light we passed. As we waited for a tired looking couple to cross the street, I couldn’t help but notice a sparkling window in some empty shop on the corner, reflecting our headlights like a thousand little diamonds. I thought it was pretty until I looked closer - It was shattered, the hundreds of cracks all leading to one small point in the middle, like a spiderweb. _We aren’t even in the worst of it,_ I thought, _we’re still on the outskirts._ But it was a bullet hole, without a doubt, and I didn’t care to think much more about it.

It was quiet, too, an unsettling quietness that pulls you into a false sense of security if you let it. It was always loud downtown - our downtown, that is - whether from the chattering of crowds or a nearby concert, it seemed impossible to find a silent spot. I’d never considered it ‘comforting,’ or anything at all, until now.

“Sure is quiet,” I said with an awkward cough, and Armin nodded.

“Probably something going on somewhere that we don’t know about,” Mikasa reasoned. “Besides, there’s nothing to do here anyway.”

She had a point there, it was a dead street. It seemed to serve as a border between the safety of Larksville and the unpredictable St. Saffron, so idiot kids like us would have time to turn around if they had any sense. I wanted to ask why we weren’t taking the hint, but the car came to a creaking halt before I had the chance.

“This is it?” Armin asked, one hand on the door handle and the other fiddling with a loose strand of hair. It was a little brick storefront with tall glass windows that occupied most of the front wall. The inside seemed fitting - dimly lit and filled to the brim with wooden crates and wall-mounted guitars.

“Mhm,” Mikasa tossed her keys into her jacket pocket and nodded at a spot above the entrance, where a flickering _‘RECORDS’_ sign was hung. “Cute, isn’t it?”

“I wouldn’t call it _cute,_ ” I said. “Sketchy, maybe, but not _cute_.”

“Okay, smartass, it’s _charming.”_

I couldn’t argue with that, especially once we got inside. It was small, sure, but whoever put the place together knew how to create an atmosphere. It smelled like alcohol - a smell I hated in most circumstances, but it seemed appropriate here - and incense. And sure enough, Annie was leaned up against the counter, looking even more intimidating than usual. It was weird seeing her outside of school, especially here.

“Didn’t think you’d actually come,” I heard her say to Mikasa while Armin and I flipped through a stack of albums I’d never seen in my life. He was going on about something, but I had my heart set on eavesdropping. “It’s hard to get anyone to set foot in here."

“It’s a bad spot,” Mikasa agreed. “Why don’t you move further in?”

“Into St. Saffron?” Annie scoffed. “I can’t fucking stand those people, hell, normal customers are bad enough.”

“What, heroin addicts aren’t your type?”

“Oh, they’re alright. It’s the sober ones you have to watch out for.”

I stifled a laugh at that. Maybe she wasn’t such a creep, but she still unnerved me, with her unfaltering poker face and what I’d first thought was an inability to speak at all. I’d known her since middle school - or at least known _of_ her - and this was the most I’d heard her say in one sitting. “Do you think she lives here?” Armin asked.

“I guess so,” I said, glancing back. “I mean, she _looks_ like it.”

“Hey, I can hear you fuckers,” she shouted at us. “You’re lucky I’m on the clock right now.”

“Some way to talk to your customers,” I thought, or I _thought_ I thought it, but something about Armin’s face implied that I might have said it out loud. Annie’s face, which resembled that of a pissed off cat, was further evidence of my fuck-up.

Mikasa dramatically slapped a palm against her forehead, diffusing most of the tension in the air. “Hey, you know what? I’m such an idiot - I mean, wow,” she stammered as she gave me an all-too-familiar glare. “I think I left my wallet in the car… Eren, would you mind -”

“Yeah, yeah,” I threw my hands into the air and made my way towards the door before she could finish. I knew as well as she did that her wallet was in her pocket, but I could take a hint. Armin mouthed a silent _do you want me to come with you?_ at me, but I shook my head, figuring it was best for everyone, including myself, if I left for a while. Which was funny, considering the whole point of the outing - according to Mikasa - was to get me ‘out of the house.’ That’s a nice way of saying _‘hey, how about you come third wheel in a dingy store while I chat up my creepy crush - oh, and also, I’m gonna kick you out while it’s dark in the most dangerous part of town,’_ but I should’ve seen it coming.

I took a seat on the concrete steps in front of the entrance, knowing it’d be a while before they were done in there. It was pleasantly chilly outside, chilly in the way the air gets when summer is just coming to a close; not quite cold, but not warm either. It was a nice change. At the very least, it gave me a good excuse to be wearing a sweatshirt.

The street felt less menacing after having been kicked to its curb, I realized. The street lights had turned on, so it was actually brighter than it had been when we’d arrived, despite their flickering and occasional burnt out bulbs. Scattered people had appeared from wherever they were before, and I watched as they wandered - or staggered, depending on the person - down the sidewalk. Some of them were holding hands, some were talking to themselves… a few stopped to sit just inside an alley, which I was confused by, until I remembered that homeless people exist. Larksville’s low population of homeless people had always been a bragging point, but the reality of it was that there were plenty of them. They’d just all been pushed out into places like this.

I looked over my shoulder through the glass door, hoping to see Annie closing the place up and ushering everyone out, but she was still mid-conversation with Mikasa. Armin was nowhere in sight, of course.

They had a lot of fucking nerve, dumping me outside without even letting me into the car. Just because Mikasa was a backstreet badass with friends in the right places didn’t mean I was, and if that was going to be a problem then they shouldn’t have invited me in the first place.

I ran my hands through my hair and stood up. I’d spent the last weeks laid up in my bed, bored to death, and this was as good an opportunity as any to have some fun. I dusted my jeans off before setting off at a brisk pace down the sidewalk.

I felt more sheltered than ever, tripping on broken bits of concrete and passing strangers - not strangers like I was used to, either, but strangers that looked at the ground as they walked like their lives depended on not making eye contact. Maybe it did. Maybe I was the stupid one, looking up and peeking into every sidestreet I saw… But it was thrilling, and I craved that thrill. It was what I’d been waiting for, what I should’ve been seeking out during those hours I spent in bed waiting for something to happen.

 _My life is so damn boring,_ I thought, seconds before hearing a startling growl coming from somewhere below me. I stopped in my tracks and lowered my eyes to the ground. I didn’t see it at first, in the blackness of the unlit alley I’d wandered into, but it didn’t take long for my eyes to adjust. It was a dog - just an ordinary dog, pitch black with warm amber eyes. It was hunched over and looked a little menacing for a starving stray, but I was far more afraid of being attacked by a human.

“Hi there,” I held my hand out, stupidly, as if out of some primal desire to befriend the animal. It sniffed at me before turning around and trotting off further into the darkness, and - _stupidly_ \- I followed it. That’s how stories start, right? You’re somewhere unfamiliar, a little scary, maybe, and there’s someone - an animal, probably - and it’s mysterious so you follow it, and it leads you into some other world, like, Narnia, or -

 _“Hi there,”_ an invisible hand pushed me against the damp wall I’d been using as a guide. Time froze the second my head hit the wall. I opened my mouth to gasp, or scream, or say _something,_ anything, but another hand covered my mouth before I could open it. I couldn’t even see the dog anymore, it was so fucking _dark._

“What’re _you_ doing in a place like this?” The voice spoke again. Condescending and mocking, like someone scolding a pet. It was a man, I realized, and there was someone else with him. For a second I wondered how the hell I was supposed to answer that question with his clammy hand covering my mouth.

I felt a tug at my shirt - multiple tugs, from multiple places, from multiple hands - and was suddenly hit with the realization that I did _not_ want to get raped and murdered, blind and silent in a dark place. I screamed but it was muffled. I kicked out and felt nothing - the men were at my sides, I figured, and one of them had my wrists and I did _not_ want this at _all -_

“You’re not from here, huh?” It was a different voice, now, and I wondered how many people there were - it could be ten or twenty and how would I know? I wouldn’t, it was so dark. “You’re one of those North Larksville kiddos, aren’t you? Come on Bert, lettim’ talk.”

The hand wordlessly disappeared. “Let me fucking _go -”_

“Woah now, take it easy, we’re just messin’ around.” The speaker shone a flashlight in my eyes. “Where you from?”

I squinted and tried to get a good look at their faces but my vision was spotty from the light. “None of your fucking business, and I have people waiting on me, so you better let me go or they’ll -”

My word vomit was interrupted _again,_ not by a voice but by a sudden incessant barking. I couldn’t see a thing but I knew it was that damn dog. In a blur, the flashlight turned off, the men let go of me, and a dim light appeared above a door, a door that was flung open by _another_ man, who began shouting something that I was too dazed to understand. I looked down at my chafed wrists and realized I would have to explain that away, somehow, when I got home.

I shook my head and looked up. The man who’d emerged from the door was still shouting something, something about the alley being ‘his property.’ He seemed angry as hell, and I couldn’t for the life of me make the connection between whatever just happened to me, and whatever this guy was on about, and the dog - who had stopped barking, thank God. It stood with its head level to the loud guy’s waist - he was probably a whole foot shorter than me.

I turned my attention to the men he was yelling at. One was very tall and very blonde, and one was even taller, with dark hair and a deadpan face. I felt like there had been more, but maybe the rest of them ran off. I’d probably never know.

“You think you’re hot shit running around here raping kids half your age? You don’t have anything better to do? Grow the fuck up and go get drunk like the rest of us, there’s plenty to go around,” the short one barked, one hand on the doorway of wherever he’d come out of and one hand on the neck of the dog - _his_ dog, I figured. They resembled each other, dark and threatening and self-assured.

“Aw, Levi, we weren’t gonna _rape_ the dude,” the blonde one spoke up, and I shuddered at the thought. “Just take his pocket change or whatever, we’re just messin’ around -”

“I don’t have any money,” I said without thinking, and immediately regretted it due to my shaking voice. The adrenaline had worn off, and I felt like I was twelve years old again. The short guy - Levi, I guessed - looked at me, and he didn’t look any less angry.

“You better be damn glad you don’t,” he said, staring me down. “I don’t know what the fuck you thought you were doing wandering into a dark alley, did you _want_ to get mugged? That’s how you get mugged. Brats like you are sheltered for a reason.” I didn’t say anything, because talking didn’t seem to be my strong suite on this evening. He told the other guys to get out of his face - they did, very quickly - before turning back to me. He looked like he didn’t know what to do with me and, truthfully, neither did I.

I was suddenly hit with a bout of dizziness, and it must have shown on my face.

“Fuck, shit, I don’t - God,” he rubbed his hand across his face. “I don’t have time… Okay, _fuck._ Alright. Come in here,” he gestured toward the open door. I glanced at the dog, who hadn’t taken its eyes off me.

“Don’t be afraid of the damn dog, she’s mine and she won’t kill you unless I tell her to.”

I decided to take that answer at face value.

The place I had been invited into was a bar. I’d never been in one prior to this, but I’d watched enough movies to know what a bar looked like. We passed an open area of chairs and tables before the man - whose name had escaped me somewhere along the line - sat me down on a leather sofa in a lounge sort of area. It was the most comfortable sofa in the world. He disappeared for a moment before returning and setting a glass on the coffee table in front of me.

I looked at the glass for what felt like an inappropriately long time. Time was moving so fast only moments ago, it was like it’d slowed down to level out again. “Is this vodka?” I asked.

“What?”

“Is this -”

“Oh my God, no, no. It’s water.”

I met his eyes. He looked almost as tired as I felt, and I decided he must be too tired to lie, and what difference would getting drunk make, anyway?

“How old are you, kid?”

“Eighteen,” I said between shaky sips. It was, in fact, water. “Were they gonna kill me?”

“Jesus, no,” he did that thing again, the rubbing his palm across his face.

“I thought they were,” I said. “I thought they were gonna kill me.” I wasn’t sure if I was talking at all or just thinking loud thoughts, and I was only half positive that whoever was sitting across from me was a real person. I was waiting to wake up at home, or in Mikasa’s beat up nissan, or anywhere other than here.

I smoothed my hair back - it had become a tangled mess, with being shoved against a wall and everything. The state of my hair was important to me, even now. It was wet in the back, and my hand was sticky when I pulled it out of the tangles.

“Is that blood?” The guy asked. I shook my head, but he leaned over the table to get a better look. “Wait,” he got up and moved to the seat beside me. “Turn your head -”

I stared at my hand while he combed through my hair with his own hand. I didn’t _feel_ like I was bleeding, so I wasn’t too worried.

“Are you here alone?” he asked as he got up and opened a cabinet across the room.

“I guess,” I said. “I came with people, but...” _They probably left._

“Better figure it out,” he said as he pulled out a towel and a pair of the ugly blue gloves they keep at hospitals.

I pulled my phone out and had a few unexpected texts.

**Mikasa 7:02 PM**

where are u???

**Mikasa 7:11 PM**

did u get a cab home??? do they even have cabs here lol

**Mikasa 7:15 PM**

ok i’m taking armin home see u monday bro

**Mikasa 7:15 PM**

sorry if i was a bitch

I checked the timestamps, no doubt she was at home and in bed by now, her last text was over an hour ago. I sighed and tilted my head back. I had no money for a fucking cab, maybe she should’ve thought of that before leaving me stranded in a place like this. We shouldn’t have come. Armin was right, he’s _always_ right.

“Okaaay…” The stranger returned - though I guess he wasn’t much a stranger anymore. He took the seat beside me again, hands gloved and holding a wet towel. I wondered if I should be at a doctor right now, and not underrage in a bar on a nameless street. “Turn - no, other way - right there.” I didn’t realize my head hurt until the towel touched it, but I didn’t protest.

“I’m going to be in so much fucking trouble.” I thought aloud. “I don’t know how to get home. I don’t know where I am. I don’t even know your name.”

“Okay, I don’t know yours either, so let’s start there,” he said, sounding somehow aggravated and understanding at the same time. I liked the way he talked. It made my head hurt less.

“I’m Eren,” I said. At least I could remember that much.

“And I’m Levi.” His voice was soft and deep for such a small person. “...and you’re in a bar - my bar, actually. You’re also in the biggest baddest shittiest part of town. Can’t tell you how to get home, but Google maps is a beautiful thing, isn’t it?”

“I don’t have a car,” I mumbled.

“Well I do,” Levi said. “...Sort of. It’ll do.”

“You’ll take me home?” I asked. I didn’t have a very good sense of when things were becoming dangerous - obviously - but something about an almost-stranger offering to take me home didn’t feel totally right. “You’re not gonna kill me?”

“Oh, I might,” he taunted.

I sighed again. I didn’t even care anymore, I almost _wanted_ him to kill me. “Whatever,” I decided. “Do I have, like, a concussion?”

“No, you’d know if you did.” He walked into a kitchenette across the room and took the gloves off, carefully turning them inside out first. It was the first chance I’d had to get a good look at him, since my eyes had finally adjusted. He looked exactly how a St. Saffron bar owner should look - he was all black from the neck down. His hair was even black, and it didn’t appear to be dyed. He blended seamlessly with the darkness.

“Right, come on, it’s getting late.”

He closed the place up as we left, locking doors and pushing chairs in. It was a nice place, not unlike the record store. It smelled _less_ like alcohol, in fact, despite being a literal bar. We exited through a double glass door and onto the main street, a welcome alternative to the dreaded alley. I never wanted to see another alley in my life.

I fell into my own thoughts as we walked down the sidewalk, remembering the murder documentary I’d watched the other night - one of its pointers being that you should never go to a ‘second location’ with a stranger. A house, a room, a car… I glanced over at Levi. He didn’t seem like a murderer, but who would?

“Here we are,” He announced ceremoniously as we approached a parking lot, empty, except for one lonely car parked in a corner. It was black - naturally - and cleaner than clean, but still old and in obvious disrepair. He cursed under his breath as he struggled with the lock, before finally yanking the driver’s door open. “This thing’s older than you are.”

I laughed a little, out of amusement or nervousness I wasn't sure.

 

It was a quiet but comfortable ride back into the city limits. I decided that if Levi was a murderer, he would’ve murdered me by now, or let those other guys do it for him. With those worries gone, all that remained in my head was embarrassment - for being an idiot in front of someone who I couldn’t help but see as badass - and a dull, persistent ache.

“Is it really as bad as people say it is?” I asked, suddenly uncomfortable with the silence. “Living there, I mean. Do you live there? Or just work there?”

Levi looked at me sideways, his expression impossible to read. “You talk a lot for someone who just got assaulted.”

I was taken aback at his tone, so I fell back into silence, disappointed at his unwillingness to talk.

I thought that was the end of that, until he huffed and spoke up again. “It’s not _bad_ , it’s just not for everyone. I could ask you the same bullshit about living in a suburb.”

 _I’ve never been mugged in a suburb,_ I thought, but decided against saying so. “Do you like it there?” I asked instead.

“It’s hell sometimes, but what else is there?” He asked, speaking more to the air than to me. “Getting a part-time shelf-stocking job? Going back to school?”

“What’s wrong with that?”

We were at a red light then, so he turned to look at me. “It’s boring.” And I couldn’t argue with that, so I didn't.

 

It wasn’t long before we began passing familiar buildings; first the Mcdonald’s Armin and I would visit after particularly shitty days, then the intersection near the school, and then - finally - the stop-sign on my street, hung slightly crooked on its pole. I’d never been so happy to see it.

“Is this it?” Levi asked as we slowed to a stop in front of my house. The lights were off, which meant Dad was probably passed out, which meant I _might_ not get screamed at. Maybe.

“Yeah, thanks,” I said absentmindedly as I shut the door behind me. I felt like I should say more, but I was about as good at thank-yous as I was at apologies.

“What, for being a decent person?” He retorted bitterly, leaning out the open window. “I can’t let some kid get his ass beat in front of my bar, it’s not good for our image.”

I rolled my eyes. “I can’t imagine what image you’re trying to uphold over there.”

“One that doesn’t scream ‘hey, come here to get murdered,’ preferably.” He was joking, I figured, but his poker-face never faltered. “Anyways,” he went on, hurriedly as if he might change his mind. “If you get bored, come pay us a visit.” He handed me a small piece of paper.

“I’m - I’m underage, I can’t just hang out at bars -"

“Look, some time in the real world might do you good.” He paused in thought. “...And _I’m_ not going to call the cops on you.”

I squinted at him, suddenly aware of the smoothness of his skin and silkiness of his voice. He didn’t seem like such a typical bar owner, then, in the moonlight. He seemed more like someone I’d pass in the hall at school, someone I’d see sitting outside a classroom, sulking after being sent out.

“How old are you, anyway?” I finally asked, finding the thought impossible to ignore.

He smirked, as if he’d been expecting me to ask the whole time. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

 _I would,_ I thought, _that’s why I asked._ “You don’t look old enough to run a business,” I said, sounding snarkier than I’d meant to.

“And you don’t look old enough to read,” he snapped back. “I’m co-owner, smartass.”

“So you’re at least twenty-one.”

“I don’t drink.” Of course, why would a _bar_ owner drink _alcohol?_ I was about to point out the irony, but he spoke first. “Look, I’d love to sit here and play twenty questions, but I do have shit to do.” He nodded at the paper he’d given me. “God, no wonder you’re so depressed, living up here. Give it some thought.”

He rolled the window up and drove off, peeling down the road like he was driving something much nicer than a twenty year old Honda Civic. I rolled my eyes at the absurdity of everything - getting kicked out of the record store all those hours ago would’ve been enough to make the day stick out to me. I almost wished it had ended it that, but I couldn’t say the rest wasn’t fun. Well, not _fun,_ but it was something. Levi was especially something.

I exhaled - I hadn’t realized I was holding my breath - and turned to go inside.

The house was silent save for the quiet humming of the air conditioner and dripping of the kitchen sink. It was also pitch black - I was _sick_ of pitch black - so I flipped on every lightswitch I passed. _And_ it was a disaster. I had to step over piles of laundry and boxes of papers just to get into my room, where the mess was only slightly less horrible. At least I kept my clothes in a designated corner.

I flopped onto my unmade bed and stared into the bright light on the ceiling fan above me. After wiggling out of my sweatshirt and kicking my shoes off, I reached into my back pocket and pulled out the paper Levi’d given me. It was an address, hastily written.

_442 laurence st._

I turned it over to see another note written on the back.

_come in through the FRONT._

I chuckled at that and wondered when he’d written it. I hated how easily I trusted him - the whole thing was shady, from our first words to our last… But my point still stood, he hadn't murdered me, and he had no shortage of opportunities. And who said you can’t be nice _and_ a total badass? I recalled, with some difficulty, what he last said to me - _“No wonder you’re so depressed, living up here…”_

I thought about it and felt an uncomfortable lump in my stomach. It wasn’t like I’d spilled my guts to him or anything, it felt like we’d barely talked at all. He had no reason to think I was anything other than a normal teenager, I thought - maybe a little more stupid than normal, but still. Not _depressed_.

I held one arm over my head and let my eyes wander from the scraped palm of my hand to my forearm, criss-crossed with lines, some a few shades lighter than my natural skin, and some a few shades darker. _Like crooked railroad tracks,_ I thought. But he hadn’t seen, and it would’ve been too dark to tell anyway. I was wearing a sweatshirt. He _couldn’t_ have seen.

I was overthinking it, I decided, so I pushed the thought from my head. It wasn’t like it mattered - I’d probably never see him again anyway.

...But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to.

**Author's Note:**

> wow haven't written in a while. hope y'all enjoy, i have put a lot of thought into this although i'm also sort of making it up as i go. it's more fun that way... and it means that if anyone has any fitting headcanons or theories, i can throw em in here with ease, which is even more fun ! so feel free to leave some conspiring comments, i appreciate each and every one. woohooooo


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